#303 - Joe Wojcik - Confetti, Special Effects, Event Production & AI in the Entertainment Industry

Joe is a seasoned international business executive with over 25 years of experience in global expansion, operations, and business transformation. Having lived in Japan and Hong Kong for seven years, he has successfully launched and grown businesses in over 50 countries.Currently President of Artistry In Motion, Joe led the company to record sales and profitability in 2023. Previously, he held leadership roles at Herbalife, Rodan + Fields, Arbonne, and Delphi Display Systems, driving international growth and operational excellence.

As founder of Endurance Business Solutions, he advises companies on strategic market entry.Joe holds an MBA from California State University and a BS in Engineering from Rutgers University.

A competitive endurance athlete, he has completed multiple Ironman Triathlons and eight Boston Marathons.

This episode is brought to you by ETC and Artistry In Motion

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
I would say I thought, well, it's, you know, it's confetti.
How hard could it be to learn the confetti business?
When I tell people I'm in the confetti business or talk about
artistry motion, a lot of peoplejust react with surprise and
they say, wow, I never really thought about that.
Like a company to develop a confetti, you see it and it's in
all these events, but you never really think about how it gets
there or who's behind that. Hello there, and again, thanks

(00:51):
for joining me today. I appreciate having everyone
here. We love our listeners, of
course, and without you, we don't have much of A podcast.
So keep listening, sharing, liking, subscribing.
You know the game, you know the routine.
We appreciate you and we love that we continue growing this
podcast. Really super proud of the fact

(01:12):
that we now have arguably the largest brand in all of lighting
and most iconic brand in all of lighting, ETC, as a new sponsor.
And secondly, Artistry in Motion, who are arguably the
largest name in confetti. Really happy to have them on
board as well. Very colorful brand, very nice

(01:32):
company. They've had some really cool
things that they've been involved with recently.
And actually we have their President, Joe Wojick on today
who will share some of that information with us.
And so yes, thank you to both ofour new sponsors.
We appreciate it. Of course, again, our platform
keeps growing and that is evidence of it.

(01:54):
So of course, I have to talk about AII, haven't talked to you
for a bit about this and there'sa few things I wanted to bring
up today. Have you heard about this, this
term vibe coding? And it's funny because it was
actually named by I forget the guy's name.
It's like Alex Alexi, you know, a Russian name basically, but

(02:16):
he's a famous AI creator. He's on X and probably other
platforms as well. Talks a lot about AI, talks a
lot about coding and really, really smart dude.
But he was just talking one day and said, you know, instead of
setting up a, a complex coding environment, I love to use tools
like cursor and lovable and, andnow bolt and some of the these

(02:36):
other ones that are out who, where you can just do voice
prompts or you can type in prompts and say, I want a
website that's going to do this cool thing and, and it's going
to look like this and create this and whatever.
And boom, it just starts coding.So it's, it's kind of like
jamming or, or just kind of goofing around and ending up

(02:57):
with really cool coding that's done by AI.
And so he, he coined the term vibing and it just took off and
vibe coding became sort of AI coding.
And so all of these really cool new AI products.
And it's funny because typical of AI, like one thing is really

(03:20):
hot. Like I remember just talking
about and seeing and trying Boltmaybe two weeks ago, and now I'm
seeing 20 other apps out there that do the same basic thing
that Bolt does. It happens very quickly in AI.
Obviously it's a very quick technology, so it would only
make sense that it moves along very quickly as well.

(03:41):
So yeah, that's kind of cool. And, and So what, what is
vibing? What does it do?
Like I said, it's instead of setting up, you know, this
really complex coding environment with, with coders
and, and you know, lots and lotsof tools and, and tech and
stuff, you are literally just prompting a, an AI coding engine
of some sort and telling it whatyou want to do and, and it'll

(04:04):
start producing results immediately.
So it's sort of like rapid prototyping in the manufacturing
world or in songwriting, insteadof getting the whole band
together and sitting around in writing circles and, you know,
doing it in a very sort of official way.
It's, it's like grabbing a guitar and sitting out in your
backyard and, and singing along and strutting along and you end

(04:25):
up writing, you know, a huge hitor something.
So that's vibing. It's just getting in a vibe
where you're just communicating with this AI tool that is
building stuff and you're going,no, that's not what I want.
This is I want something a little more like this or a
little more like that. And so he called it vibing and
it's stuck in and that is now called vibe coding.

(04:48):
Of course, with AI we've learnedall kinds of new words.
So another one that people come to me about a lot and they say,
how are you using AI agents? And what exactly are there are
our AI agents? And it's a pretty simple term
for a pretty general topic of they're, they're helpers.
They're basically AI helpers that it's like having a sidekick

(05:10):
that is an AI app or an AI tool.And you know, digital
assistants, some people call them digital assistants.
They can do all sorts of tasks. They can, they can code simple
things. They can make decisions, solve
problems, search for things, a lot of things AI agents can do.
And in fact, I'm actually in theprocess.

(05:31):
We're in a dev cycle developmentcycle right now with Gear Source
where we're building some reallynew cool technology and a lot of
stuff on top of Gear Source right now.
And we're enabling a whole bunchof agents in doing this.
So we're not using agents to build it, but we're building
agents into the process so that our our customers can use agents

(05:54):
to do things like search for gear and and other things like
that. So I'm not going to tell you too
much about it because we are going to make some announcements
in the next couple of months, but we are engaging not just one
agent. So it it's a little different
than having employees or whatever.
Of course, they're not human, but also agents tend to be very
specialized. So you might have an agent that

(06:15):
does this one task really, really well and it does it all
the time. You might have another agent
that does something else. And so that's, that's basically
what agents are and how you would enable them.
And I think many of you are probably already using agents,
AI agents, and you don't know it.
I know we are, we use them in HubSpot pretty regularly, which
is our CRM and our communicationhub.

(06:37):
We use agents daily in that I used agent, the agents, you
know, probably 20 times a day and for different things.
And so, you know, agents for especially small companies, if
you're a small business and you're always thinking, Oh my
God, I wish I could hire five more people, or I wish I could
find 5 more people, or I wish I could clone myself is a common

(07:00):
thing, especially among us entrepreneurs because we think
we can do everything right and everybody else can't, which
isn't true of course, but you know, agents do that for you.
Agents basically can take thingsthat you would normally do that
take two hours and do it in 30 seconds or two minutes and do it

(07:21):
for you where all you have to dois say, hey, agent do this and
it'll do it to the best of its ability, which is usually even
better than you would do it yourself.
So I definitely would recommend that you yourself go figure out
a use of agents. We are going to see desk
programming agents. We're going to see, you know,

(07:42):
any tasks that are complex and take a lot of your time.
I can see agents getting involved in those tasks in our
industry and every other industry.
And So what else did I want to talk about?
Oh, I'm hearing about this this bubble.
You remember the tech bubble. If you're old like me, you
probably remember a few bubbles,but there was a big tech bubble

(08:04):
in in 1999, two thousand. This is when pets.com and some
of these massivesocks.com, therewere like a bunch of sites that
were started up in this, this boom, this tech boom at the end
of the 90s that were just ridiculous.

(08:24):
Like pets.com, sox.com were two of the, the ones that I can
remember really well, but there were hundreds of them.
And it created this bubble whereit burst and lots of people lost
lots and lots of money. And I mean, these companies were
raising like $10 million in a, in an, a round of, of venture
capital and spending half of it on a launch party for something

(08:44):
that was never going to make anymoney at all.
And it was just crazy. It was loony times.
And so people are saying there'sanother sort of bust coming in
AI right now. And it's partially driven by the
amount of money that has been spent on on these data centers,
You know, these massive, massivestructures that they're spending
hundreds of billions, trillions of dollars building these data

(09:06):
Centers for AI. And one of the things that AI is
doing right now is becoming muchmore efficient where it doesn't
need as much compute. And when the compute goes down,
you don't need these data centers quite as much as you
used to. And there are also starting to
be competitors to NVIDIA who arecoming out with with more

(09:27):
efficient chips or more efficient technology.
And so, you know, when things grow as quickly as AI has, you
know, just like a blink basically.
And it's gone from being nothingto being everywhere.
You could expect that there's going to be some stuff that that
probably doesn't connect well ordoesn't make money, doesn't
become profitable and, and goes by the wayside.

(09:48):
And so of course, again, investors are going to lose a
lot of money because they're allbetting on these things that are
going to become unicorns, which are these like 1000 X companies,
you know, you, you buy in at a value of a million and it ends
up being a billion within a veryshort period of time.
And a lot of people are just gonna lose money on this stuff,

(10:08):
so watch for that. I'll keep talking to you about
AI, of course, as always, if anybody ever wants any kind of
pointers or anything. I'm not a genius, but I've been
using it for a long time and I understand it pretty well.
You know, there are certainly people who are more technical
than me, but if you are just a small business owner or, or a
person who is just like, how do I get started?

(10:30):
Like how can I, how can I write A blog using AI?
How can I, you know, Google's hitting me with all these new
tools and Facebook's hitting me with all these new tools.
What do I do with these things? As you know, like of course,
everything can write your e-mailfor you.
It's funny, it's probably one ofthe few things I don't use AI
for right now because I want to use my own words, not somebody

(10:50):
else's. But anyways, reach out to me
anytime, happy to talk to anyoneand help you through you know
your AI journey if I can help atall.
And before I get on to today's guest, once again, I want to
thank both ETC and Artistry in Motion.
Amazing new sponsors, love having you on board.
Look forward to working togetherfor a long time.

(11:12):
So today's guest, Joe Wojick, and I know I'm spell pronouncing
it wrong. If I told you the spelling, you
wouldn't know how to pronounce it either.
But Joe is a seasoned international business executive
with over 25 years of experiencein global expansion, operations
and business transformation. Having lived in Japan and Hong
Kong for seven years, he has successfully launched and grown

(11:34):
businesses in over 50 countries.Currently President of Artistry
in Motion, which we're going to talk about today, Joe led the
company to record sales and profitability in 2023.
Previously, he held leadership roles at Herbalife, Rodent and
Fields, Arbonne, and Delphi Display Systems, driving
international growth and operational excellence.

(11:57):
As founder of Endurance BusinessSolutions, he advises companies
on strategic market entry. Joe holds an MBA from California
State University and ABS in engineering from Rutgers
University. A competitive endurance athlete,
he has competed multiple Ironmantriathlons and eight Boston

(12:18):
Marathons. Where does he find the time?
Please welcome Joe Wojick. Joe, good morning.
How are you? Hello, Marcel, I'm doing well.
How about you? I'm doing OK.
Yeah, it's, it's what is it Wednesday, midweek, IE.
I appreciate you doing this first and foremost.
I know it's a little bit early in the morning over there

(12:38):
probably. Oh no, it's 10:30.
And I was excited to do this because quite honestly, you
know, I, along with most of our industry, probably never thought
an awful lot about Confetti in the past.
And, and I've learned a bunch about it recently.
It is a big part of some really big shows.
You know, I could name a bunch of them, but I think people know

(12:58):
Coldplay being at the top of that list of, of bands who
really have made Confetti a hugepart of their shows and Taylor
Swift. And there's loads of them,
right? Yeah, indeed.
Yeah, Well, no, thank you for having me on the show.
And I'm, I appreciate the opportunity.
And yeah, indeed. You know, when I tell people I'm
in the confetti business or they're, you know, talk about

(13:19):
artistry motion, a lot of peoplejust react with surprise and
they say, wow, I never really thought about that.
Like a company developed a confetti and you know, you see
it and it's in all these events,but you never really think about
how it gets there or who's behind that.
So it's, yeah, it's an interesting.
One, I don't think people understand the scale.
You know, the fact that, and we'll get into it, you know,
the, the fact that you're sending pallets of this stuff

(13:41):
out to some of these tours and you know, people, people just
think confetti, it's a little bag and you're going to kind of
throw it at a wedding or something.
And that's all it is. But you know, I've come to learn
a little bit about your company and it's incredible some of the
stuff you do. So we'll get there.
But I, you know, most people that I have on my podcast,
admittedly, I usually know an awful lot about them because

(14:05):
they've been in the industry for30 or 40 years or more
sometimes. And but you're relatively new to
this industry, right? I am indeed.
Yes, I've been with Artistry in Motion for 5 1/2 years now.
And so I'm a, relatively I, I would say I'm a newcomer in the
industry. And so for me it's exciting and

(14:25):
I, I feel like a little kid and I'm very curious and, you know,
I, I, I try to learn as much as I can and attend trade shows and
I go out on our shows and eventsand, you know, masquerade as a
technician. And so, yeah, it's, it's, it's
pretty exciting. But I've had kind of a, I'll say
kind of a different background, if you will, from people that
have been in the special effectsindustry.

(14:45):
Yeah. I want to learn about that, but
I want, I want to ask you a question 1st about what you just
said, because, you know, I know our industry sometimes isn't
very kind to people who come from outside the business.
The outsiders coming into our industry sometimes are not
treated the same or maybe they're not invited in right
away into that sort of gold circle of trust or whatever you

(15:07):
want to call it. Did you see any of that?
Like were were people a little, you know, who's this guy kind of
attitude or, or did they just welcome you instantly?
Well, I, I, I'd say in general, you know, I felt welcome.
Or if, if, if there was that vibe, either I didn't pick up on
it or I didn't, I didn't notice it.
You know, I, I think just certainly when I, when I first

(15:27):
got here, I had to, had to learnthe, the confetti industry and
the, the special effects industry and, and our top
clients and things like that. And so as I said, I was, I was
anxious to learn and, and approached it in that manner.
And, and I think you know, with the, the personalities and I've,
I've had a great experience so far with the, with the industry.

(15:48):
Proper degrees and a proper background in proper businesses.
You came into this and went, whoa, you know, this is a
business. And, and because it is,
sometimes it's a little wild, Wild Westy.
Yeah, indeed. And, and I think I have to say
that when I, when I first made the transition into the confetti
business from a more conventional background, I would
say I thought, well, it's, you know, it's confetti.

(16:09):
How hard could it be to learn the confetti business?
But I have to say, and I, and I tell people this all the time,
you know, people were bringing on board.
It's it's, it's pretty tricky, right?
There's a lot of different dynamics.
Just it's just even in the production of Fetty, right?
And I'm using a lot of math skills and geometry and algebra,
just determining yields and different shapes and die cuts

(16:30):
and reams and roles and. Today's podcast is brought to
you by Artistry in Motion. When it's time to make a moment
unforgettable, Artistry in Motion delivers.
Since 1994, they've been the go to source for top tier confetti
and streamer special effects, turning ordinary events into
explosive show stopping experiences.

(16:52):
From concerts and TV productionsto major sporting events and
theme parks, they bring the wow factor with precision and
creativity. So whether you need a massive
stadium drop or a subtle pictureperfect cascade, they make it
happen on time, every time. Their team doesn't just supply,
they collaborate with show designers, event planners and

(17:14):
production teams to ensure everyeffect is camera ready and crowd
approved. Want to take your event to the
next level? Hit them up artistryinmotion.com
and let's make memories happen. You know, you, you invited me
out at one point and I visited and, and saw the factory and got
to sort of see under your skirt in, in how confetti is done

(17:37):
really. And it was way more interesting
than I ever expected it to be. And so I really want to get into
that. But you know, when I was reading
your notes today, one of the things that jumped out at me is
you actually lived in Asia for Ithink 7 or 8 years, right?
I did indeed, yes. I, I, I was fortunate enough to
have an expat assignment and it's one of those stories a year

(17:58):
many times where we're supposed to be, I was at the large
multinational company and you know, it's supposed to be a two
year assignment and it turned into a little over seven years.
And so it was really great. I'll say personally and
professionally, we, we lived in Hong Kong for two years and then
moved to Tokyo for three years and then back to Hong Kong for

(18:18):
another two years. And so it was very rewarding,
you know, I was able to learn a little bit of the languages in
each, each of the location and the cultures and customs.
Amazing experience. And it was really, I think
shaped me as a person and I, I wouldn't trade it for the world.
So I, it was a great time, you know, in my.
So you were married like you moved your family or your wife

(18:38):
or whoever over there with you or I?
I did. No, I just got married and we,
I, I, as a matter of fact, I hadjust had a baby.
I had a son who's in his 20s nowand we moved over there.
He was, I don't know, three or four months old.
And so brought him over to Hong Kong that we had another baby
while we were living in Japan. So yes, the kids were my, my

(18:59):
boys spent a significant portionof their childhood in Asia.
And so I think that was a formidable experience.
And yeah, we moved around a little bit, but.
Yeah, it was. It was great.
So cool, though. What a way to to have your so
your your son was how old when he lived there then?
Like from zero to. Eight or like zero to seven.
Yeah. And the second one's like 2.

(19:20):
Very cool, Yeah. What an experience.
I mean, it'd be even cooler if he was like 5 till 13 or
something, right? Where you could really remember
a lot of the cultural stuff. And.
And yeah. And then we made quite a, quite
a significant jump. We moved from from Hong Kong to
a small town in Idaho, you know,3000 people.

(19:41):
And so my kids, that was kind ofa culture shock, you know,
because they were very used to these big, huge cities and the
hustle and bustle of Asia. And we moved to a kind of a
sleepy little mountain town in in the middle of Idaho.
And so that was kind of a a difficult transition form, but.
I can't even imagine. Like, you know, for me.

(20:01):
I, I wouldn't even know how to handle that at my age, let
alone, you know, as a, as a small kid.
So you moved back to Idaho and and we what business were you in
when you were in Asia? So I, I was running some, like I
said, I worked for a large multinational company.
It was involved in the nutritionspace and I ran some of their
businesses over there. When I was in Japan, I ran their

(20:23):
Japanese business. And then when I was in Hong
Kong, I, I looked after their Asian business.
We had a lot of sales in in China and all throughout
Southeast Asia. So I traveled quite a bit,
pretty extensively throughout the region.
And then when I moved back to Idaho, I set up my own firm.
I had a consulting firm which the, the auspices were really

(20:45):
just to help domestic U.S. companies branch out into Asia
and Europe and Africa. I had spent a, a decent part of
my career before moving to Asia,working in Europe and Africa.
And so I, I set up this sort of global consulting firm that for
companies that wanted to, if, ifthey wanted to diversify or
expand their portfolio, you know, how do we take our

(21:07):
products to Asia? And so with my background, I
knew a lot of, you know, legal and real estate and tax and, you
know, permits and approvals, cultural.
Cultural like, you know, I know that I started doing business
with Asian companies, both on the purchasing from them side,
but also on, on selling to Asiancompanies.
And often times I just bumped myhead on things where it was

(21:31):
like, Oh no, you can't say that or you can't do that or, or they
prefer if you do it this way or,you know, don't ever ask for
this or whatever. And I, I was just like, you
know, typical of me. I dive in head first into things
and and figure it out and, and you know, I ran into a few
situations where I needed some correction, you know?

(21:54):
Yeah. And that's what I think I, I
brought, I was able to help navigate those, you know,
whether it's communication or customs or traditions or just a,
a way of doing business in addition to sort of the nuts and
bolts of how to, you know, entera country and you know, get
product approvals and permittingand you know, taxes and all that
stuff. But just the more you know the
the softer side is is important as well.

(22:16):
So Speaking of bump in your head, did you wake up in Idaho
one morning and just bump your head and go, I I need to get
into the confetti business or how did, how did that all come?
About well, I'll, I'll tell you when I, I had kind of a
circuitous way to, to the confetti business.
And you know, as we, as we dig into the story of artistry of
motion, one of the, the primary owners, he was, he, he and I

(22:40):
knew each other from a previous life.
I first started out my career inengineering capacity and I was
working at a, a very small company and kind of a funny
story. I, I was invited, I played
basketball in high school, I played lacrosse in college and,
and I was invited to a basketball tournament, A2 on 2
basketball tournament for this, this company.

(23:00):
It was like a weekend type thing.
And I got paired up with this gentleman.
His name is Richard Graves and he was the general manager of
the company. So I was in my early 20s and,
and we ended up winning the tournament.
We ended up winning this two andtwo basketball tournament
together. And so we developed a little bit
of friendship and he took an interest in my career, I would
say. And he, I, I would say he was

(23:22):
kind of a mentor to me. He ended up moving me over from
my engineering position over to sales and marketing and got me
involved in, you know, contract negotiation and sent me around a
trade shows and international travel and business, if you
will. And then he also advised me and
actually paid for me to go get my MBA.

(23:43):
So I went to school at night for4 1/2 years.
I I worked during the day and went to school at night at a
local College in Southern California.
And so, yeah, so we, we had thisrelationship and, and then we
kind of both went our separate ways.
I kind of moved over to Asia. He went and actually bought a
confetti company. He and his business partner
bought this Confetti company. I think it's been 20, gosh, 23

(24:08):
years ago or so, they bought, they bought the confetti
company. And so he and I remained in
touch and, and you know, when I was in Asia, he would invite me
to the Super Bowl every year as one of his technicians.
And so it was, it was tricky forme to get over to the US and go
to the Super Bowl for the weekend.
So I always had to politely say no.
And when I moved back to the US and I moved back to Idaho, he
said, hey, what about this year?You know, why don't you come and

(24:30):
be on our confetti team and, youknow, see how it's done?
So it, it was super fun. You know, you fly in on a Friday
and Saturday rehearsal and Sunday shoot confetti and you
leave on Monday morning. And and so I did that for a
number of years and just as as his friend, if you will, and he
hosted me and I got to learn just one little sliver of the
confetti business in that sense where I I was a technician at

(24:53):
the Super Bowl. And you got to go to the Super
Bowl. You know which.
Isn't that easy so. It, it was great.
And so towards the end of his tenure, you know, he was a
little bit older and said, Hey, I'm, I've, I've been doing this
for 20 years. I'm, you know, getting tired and
I want to do some other stuff inmy life.
Why don't you join me here? And, you know, you, you run the

(25:16):
company out, you know, give you some training and background,
you learn the business for a little while, then we'll turn
the reins over to you. And so, so I did, I was at a
point in my career where it, it sounded fun and I was looking
for a change. And I, I made the jump and I,
you know, sort of shut down the consulting business and moved
over to artistry of motion. And you know, as, as I've heard

(25:36):
on some of your other podcasts where you talk about COVID, you
know, it was probably not, you know, looking at career choices,
it wasn't great because a few months after I joined, you know,
basically we had to go into hibernation for COVID.
And so I was questioning my career choice at that point.
But like I said, we, we did everything we could, kind of
went into hibernation and got some loans to keep us afloat,

(25:59):
kept just a really small poor group of employees here and just
I can get my way through it. Yeah.
I can only imagine you went to basically 0% of revenue, right?
Like it was not many people using COVID or competitive
during COVID. No, there were no events.
There were no theme parks. Open it.
Really, weddings and stuff like small events, like you couldn't

(26:19):
even make it on graduations and weddings and like the little
tiny business. Yeah, so it was, it was pretty
tough. I mean we had some, you know,
drive by commencements and graduations, if you will and
just these tiny little events and we use the the opportunity
to redo our website and and see things like that.
So, so, but you're, you're right, it was really mean times

(26:41):
as as most of the other companies in the special effects
industry were certainly so, but then certainly came out of it
and went very well in terms of coming out of COVID.
We had some hiccups like everybody else did just getting
back online. But so that's why I got here.
You know, it's been the long circuitous route, but I'm
really. I had no idea.
That's it. That's.
A great Story Two Days podcast is proudly brought to you by

(27:06):
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ETC Lighting, rigging and control technology has scaled
not only across the entire globe, but also to nearly any
building size and type you couldpossibly imagine.
Broadway shows, rock concerts, sports stadiums, outdoor parks,

(27:28):
TV studios, convention centers, you name it, have all trusted
ETC to make their design beautiful and their spaces safe.
A big part of that trust comes from ETC's renowned customer
support. The global 24/7 tech support
team stands behind every ETC product, whether you're in the
middle of tech on a high school theater production, or

(27:51):
scheduling a light show on the facade of an iconic building.
ET CS support has always been incredibly responsive and
helpful. But now employees have even more
of a personal stake in maintaining that reputation.
The company has become 100% employee owned.
Each person building the fixtures, developing the control

(28:14):
software and picking up calls isan owner at ETC.
Outstanding support, reliable products, innovative technology.
This is the foundation of excellence that ETC has built
over the past 50 years. Oh what?
What year did you start it? Name. 2019 I started it.

(28:37):
Yeah, just just before COVID, right?
Yes, yes indeed. So artistry in Motion, I, I
guess is a sort of SMB, you know, not not a huge business,
not a ton of employees or anything, but how, how do you
first of all, how do you get involved in some of the larger
deals that they have? Like are there not, you know,

(29:01):
mega companies out there like, you know, on, on the production
side, you've got solo tech and PRG.
Is there not a solo tech and PRGof, of confetti or is confetti
niche? And and it's more small
businesses that are really focused on confetti.
Yeah, I think we're, we're just,yeah, I think we've built up
such a a good reputation, I'd say in the industry through many

(29:23):
different verticals, right. You've got the touring industry,
you've got professional sports with theme parks.
And so I think, you know, over the years, in the last, you
know, 25, almost 30 years now, the company has built up such a
good reputation and we've got great service and great products
I believe. And so that has really helped us
to avail ourselves to all these different companies of the PRG.

(29:48):
They're a client of ours and we saw them hardware and then we
have a number of clients that are integrators, if you will,
special effects companies that will offer everything.
And we're one small part. So we're the confetti and
streamer experts, if you will. And then they can offer to their
client, you know, the haze and the fog and the cryo and the
pyro and things like that. Yeah.

(30:09):
So you were saying that when yougot into the business, you
didn't realize how how complicated it was.
You thought, you know, how difficult could this really be?
We're just blasting a little piece of paper up into the air.
So what what are some of the complications of the confetti
business? Well.
I would say, you know, certainlythe, the raw materials, right,
or supply chain. And we, we source all of our

(30:33):
confetti, all of our tissue confetti and our metallic
confetti, all of our, our raw materials are sourced from the
United States. And so it's all has to be flame
retardant, right? All these, all these arenas and
venues, you have to have flame retardant material.
So we have to ensure the, the quality and the consistency and
the inventory management. And, you know, there's some

(30:54):
pretty large tours that come through us and we have to make
sure that we have enough raw material on hand to be able to
fulfill those those orders. And it's a lot of logistics.
You know, when these tours are are going on, we've got to make
drops at the right time. So they have enough to carry on
the truck to get them through a few shows and then meet up with
the tour at the next show. And so we've got to coordinate
all that. And then, you know, certainly

(31:15):
the, the, the basics of the nutsand bolts in terms of pricing
and figuring out what the, what the yield is going to be from
the raw material and what the, what you know, the sizes and
shapes and dimensions. And it's really just helping,
helping our clients with, you know, sort of their vision and
their budget and, and what they want to see and how we can help
them get there both with the, the confetti itself and with the

(31:37):
equipment that we sell or rent to, to our clients.
So like even you were saying sizes and shapes and dimensions
and stuff. So not all confetti's the same
like I would assume, you know, confetti is all like either a
square rectangular piece of paper that sort of flutters in
the air and and it's all made out of the same paper.
And I guess there's probably different colors, but.

(31:58):
Yeah, no, I mean there's, you know, there's a standard
rectangular shape of confetti and which is kind of the
generic, if you will, it's rightinch and a half.
I think by 3/4 of an inch is kind of the standard size of a
piece of rectangular tissue confetti.
And yet we do everything from wecall Pixie dust, it's quarter
inch squares. And we'll do snow effects for

(32:21):
many, many clients where they'llwant to replicate snow.
And that's kind of a combinationof a three quarter inch square
and 1/2 inch square mixed together.
We can also do special shapes. We have probably 200 shapes in
our library right now and everything from leaves to
letters to numbers to pumpkins and stars and robots.

(32:41):
And we've got a couple 100 different shapes and, and we,
we're making them all the time. We'll have a client come to us
and say I need a, a baseball bator I need a, you know, a special
triangle or a certain company logo.
Yes, we do a lot of foam money. And so we have, I'd say, unique
capability where we can print foam money on both sides with

(33:06):
fire retardant, flame retardant paper.
And so we, we have that capability.
We're seeing that more and more,I think as as confetti people
want to have a more, you know, enticing look or something new
and different. You know, Usher last year at the
half time in Super Bowl had somemoney that, that came down and
that was provided by us And we worked with pyrotechnico on that

(33:29):
and, and which is a well known company in the industry and, and
we're able to facilitate the, wecall them Usher Bucks.
And so, like I said, we, we havesome capability both that, you
know, not just, you know, cutting, you know, little
rectangles, but you know, different shapes, different
sizes of rectangles or squares. And then custom confetti, which

(33:50):
can be, you know, it's custom imprinted with a logo or a, you
know, a phrase or some verbiage along with the, the full money
and, and things like that. We have a, a particular product
called Techniflect that's an embossed metallic confetti that
is, it doesn't cling as much as a regular PVC and it's easy to

(34:11):
clean up and it, it creates an amazing look with with lights.
And so, so we have that that particular.
When you guys like there's probably some science to this,
right? Like you're not just cutting
different sizes of paper. And I mean, even just like, so
you're printing every single oneof these.
Like if you're doing a, a dollarbill confetti or whatever, it's

(34:32):
printed on both sides on every single one of them times 10,000
or however many of them getting blasted out there.
That's wild. But when I, when I'm talking
about science, like so you mentioned, I think Pixie dust
and, and snow effects and stuff.Yeah.
So are you actually like testingcutting different shapes and
sizes and materials to make themfly differently so they look

(34:54):
more realistic? Like snow or Pixie dust or
whatever? Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah. We've got a little testing
facility in the back and we, youknow, we'll fire up whether it's
our silent storm or a big blast or mini blast, whatever, you
know, we have a a lot of different equipment.
These are like the to launch and.
Disperse. Yeah, the cannons.
So we have everything from, you know, any, you could do anything
from like a little hand toss to a streamer cup to a, a little

(35:17):
handheld confetti launcher up to, you know, our big shots.
And then we've got sound storms,a big blasters and mini
blasters. So we've got an entire suite of
equipment to, to launch or disperse the confetti.
And then we will do some testing.
Yeah, we, we will do testing andlook at, you know, how it
flutters and how it falls and, and, you know, just dial it in
in that sense and, and make surethat the, the effect that we're

(35:40):
helping to create is, you know, meets what the, the client's
looking for. Yeah, and so like, especially on
these bigger events, you know, like Super Bowl or Taylor Swift
or Coldplay or whatever, is there not like a problem where
these venues or whatever are like, what am I supposed to do
with all this stuff? You know, like you're making a
mess in a sense. But I, I guess on the flip side

(36:03):
of that, like people who are at those events are probably trying
to grab that stuff too, because they're like, hey, this is like
a momento. I can go put it on eBay.
No, indeed, indeed, no, that's agreat comment.
And we, we have, we have recognized that that trend, if
you will, that that memorabilia type of confetti or souvenir
confetti. And so we just entered into a

(36:23):
partnership with a company called The Realist and they
will, they will source memorableitems in the sports and
entertainment area and you know,either auction it off or sell
it. And so we just did a, a a thing
with them where they're selling some of the Philadelphia Eagles

(36:45):
confetti from the Super Bowl and.
So wow, that's crazy. Go on their website and it's
the, it's the confetti. So we, we like to think of it,
hey, we're helping clean it up. And then there's also a
secondary market for the collectibles.
But it's just fake, right? Like, isn't it you?
You're just printing special stuff to put in those little
packages or whatever. No, this is stuff that was
actually on the field at the Super Bowl.

(37:06):
So we we collect it and then we authenticate it.
They have authenticators there on hand.
So we collect through this the both the end of the game trophy
and the Super Bowl Vince Lombardi shaped trophy.
And it's it's collected, it's authenticated, it's been flown,
it's on the field. And then the the realist will
package it in a, you know, in this case, it's like a shakeable

(37:28):
can kind of a see through and you can shake it up and see the
confetti. And it's got, you know,
Philadelphia Eagles defeated Kansas City Chiefs February
2005. It's got the date.
It's it's a memorabilia type thing.
And so. We fear the smells from the
floor. Yeah, exactly.
It's got everything. Yeah, it's got everything.
So we think that it could be a market for us where where we can

(37:48):
capitalize with our access and with the the confetti we're
doing for some of these unique, unique environments to be able
to offer memorabilia confetti and so.
Seems to make so much sense likebecause the stuff is literally a
problem, right? So somebody's got to clean it
all up. And why not turn that like it's
recycling in a sense, you're recycling it.

(38:09):
And indeed, yeah. And covering the cost of
cleanup. At the same time and all of our
all of our tissue confetti is very environmentally friendly.
So it's it's all recyclable, it's all biodegradable, it's all
a flammatory and it's all made in the United States from post
industrial consumer material. So a lot of people say, wow, you
guys are just making a big mess.You know, we'd like to think of

(38:31):
ourselves. I mean, certainly there's a,
there's a trend with sustainability and, and caring
about the environment. We'd like to think that even
though we're making a mess, it'sa, it's, it's a, it's a clean
mess, if you will. And it's biodegradable,
Recyclable. You, you've mentioned a few
times that, that it's all sourced in the US and is that
like because you know, you're Patriots or is that because the

(38:56):
products are better? Like you're, you're obviously
there's always a lure to buy things in other countries,
especially Asian countries, China, etcetera.
There's always a lure there to do that based on profitability.
So if I'm going to sell something for $10, I could buy
it in the US for, for five and make a decent profit, or I could

(39:16):
buy it in China for $0.30 and make an enormous profit.
So why? Why?
Why is that a thing? Well, I to be, to be Canada, we
have looked at Asian sourcing and so, so far we haven't been
able to find a source in Asia that has the, the quality and

(39:39):
the consistency and the, the properties that we need, you
know, the, the flamer chart. And so we, we have looked, we
have looked and, and certainly it's, it's less expensive, but
there's also shipping and now there's duties and who knows
where those duties are going. And so, you know, we certainly
want to be patriotic, but you know, we're business people and

(39:59):
we have looked and we just haven't been able to find the
right supplier that that where it would make sense to to offer.
It's also probably like a premium product, premium clients
kind of thing, right? Like your clients expect the
best. I, I believe so, yes.
And like I said, you know, in terms of the, the, the
consistency of the, the paper and the color too, right.

(40:21):
Like we, we've got 28 different tissue colors just just tissue
alone besides like the PVC and the nonmetallic and we've got
clean free and technophilic and different materials.
But just the tissue colors alone, we have 28 of those and
you know, we want to make sure that when our clients are
getting the those colors that they've ordered.
And that's the other thing that we could do pretty well as we
can mix and match and put different ratios in a in a bulk

(40:45):
or in a sleeve. And so you can really create a
customized effect. And I think that's what our our
clients are expect from us. And maybe there is a little bit
of premium with that, with that US sourced and, and the, the
extra labor that goes into making those, those ratios.
And so, you know, as an example for the Super Bowl teams,
there's, there's specific ratiosfor each color that go into the

(41:07):
Chiefs and the Eagles and any team.
And so we, we work with through our clients in the NFL to get
those colors dialed in. And you know, it's, you know,
maybe 60% blue and 30% red and 10% white, whatever, whatever it
may be. And that's, that's I think one
of our offerings, our capabilities is to be able to
have that, you know, customized confetti look.

(41:28):
So for Super Bowl, did you have to send both teams?
Both, Both colors? Both.
Confetti. We did yes.
So we go out there, we go on thefield and you never know who's
going to win, right. And, and many years not, not
this past Super Bowl, but prior year, it was in overtime.
And so you don't know. So you bring in both colors,
both teams out on your confetti gun to each each of these

(41:50):
confetti cannons that we called the big blasters will go out and
position themselves on the sideline.
In past years, we've had 66 cannons on each sideline.
So there's 12 cannons all together.
And we'll launch the winning team, of course, and then the
the losing team will recycle it and.
So are there are that's reloadedwith each team and then you only

(42:12):
blast the ones that are loaded with the winning team?
Or do you load? Each cannon has two boxes on it.
Each cannon, each cannon goes out there and have two boxes.
And then we will launch the winning teams colors.
And it's a little tricky becausethe two things that we say in
the industry or at the Super Bowl or some of these big
football games are make sure that you you shoot the right

(42:33):
color and make sure that you shoot after the game is
officially over. You don't want any replays or,
you know, review of a call or there's 2 seconds left on the
clock. And, you know, you're kind of
the field waiting for the call from the NFL saying, hey,
confetti go. Or the game is really it's
officially, officially over. And sometimes there's a run off,
right, and the coaches are on the field shaking hands and the

(42:54):
quarterbacks are shaking hands and everybody's on the field and
the clock is still winding down and.
And. And we're just waiting.
And so, yeah. Well, you gotta love sports
then, because you sell twice as much for every game, right?
Because. You supply it for both teams.
That's hilarious. Yes, yes.
You got to get into like racing where you know, it could be 1 of
20 drivers or whatever and you got to have all the drivers

(43:17):
there, each of their numbers and, you know, depending on who
wins the race, there you go. There's a business idea.
I just, I just want a small piece of it.
I want. To thank you.
That's good. Yeah, no, that's, that's really
cool. So from a like, you know, again,
I'm a dummy. I don't know anything about
confetti from a technology standpoint.
You know, like I am an innovation guy.

(43:38):
I love innovation. I love, like I talked in the in
the intro to this podcast about AII talk a lot about AI and, and
in the industry. The part of the industry I spent
most of my time is lighting, youknow, automated lighting
specifically lot of innovation constant, you know, moving
forward, moving forward, moving forward.

(43:59):
So what are some of the ways like confetti or the delivery of
confetti are moving forward or are they, are they just stale
old businesses that could get used or?
No, there's, there's some innovation and I and I'll give
you a few examples. We have just come up with three
new products and the consumable side last year.
And so I'll tell you that the first one that we introduced was

(44:22):
a product called Glimmer and it has the IT has the look of a
metallic, but it's a tissue based.
And so I'll tell you that we have been seeing a trend in the
industry where venues and arenasand, and acts and there's just a
general trend away from PVC and away from metallic because it's
not very environmentally friendly.

(44:42):
And so we picked up on that trend and, and we, we'd see some
acts where they would say, hey, we need to order 70% of the
shows in tissue and 30% of the shows in metallic.
And we're going to use the metallic at the venues that
allow PVC and metallic because it, it, to be fair, it has a
better look, right? And the lights and it's, it's,
it's funny, it has that problem and that, that glitter look.

(45:06):
And so we embarked on an effort with our, our tissue supplier to
develop a product that like I said has, has, has a little bit
of the, the shimmer and the glean of a a metallic and yet is
tissue based. So it's biodegradable and it's
recyclable. And so we came out with a
product that we called Glimmer. Right now it's in two colors.
We have a gold and silver and soit's, it, it, I think it, we're,

(45:30):
we're trying to meet the demandsof the, the industry and maybe
the world, if you will, in termsof more sustainability and, and
they'll move away from PVC and metallic and the move to
towards, you know, more environmentally friendly
products. So we came out with that last
year and we're hoping that we can offer more of those colors
instead of just the gold and silver.
We can offer additional colors as as we go forward.

(45:53):
And those are available in all the different custom shapes and
sizes and stuff. Are those only?
Oh, really? Yes, so they're available in in
bulk, you know, in the squares and the rectangles and the
shapes. And then they're also available
in streamer format too. And so, you know, the streamers
are nice because it's easy to clean up and that's sort of the
differentiator. Streamers relatively easy to
clean up you know adds a festivelook and then the confetti's

(46:15):
certainly a little harder to clean up but you know bigger you
know a bigger coverage point if.And are you using the same
devices to deliver these to to blast them or?
Yes, yes. So they work in all of our our
equipments and all the equipmentout there to be fair.
And so, so yeah, I think that's,that's one innovation we came up
with last year. We also used to only be able to

(46:36):
print on one side. The, the custom imprinting was
only able to be done on one sideunless we wanted to do a, a, a
flammable product. And so we came up with a way
this year to be able to, we, we developed a paper that is able
to be printed on both sides where it doesn't bleed through.
So you can see it clearly on both sides and it's flame

(46:58):
retardant. So in the past we were only able
to print on one side for custom imprinting for saying money or
something like that. And now we can do two sides
custom imprinted in flammatory paper and then we also.
I would guess one of the challenges there is weight,
right? Like if it's too thick, the
paper, it's just going to kind of drop like a rock.

(47:19):
It's not going to flutter as much and do what you want
confetti to do, right? Yes, exactly.
And so there are different weights of the paper.
You know, there's a rate, there are regular generic tissue is a
10 LB paper. The stuff that we print on
normally is a 15 LB paper and then there's a 27 LB that is for
printing on both sides. So you're, you're absolutely

(47:40):
right. The weight of the papers is is
dictates sort of how you how youcan use it.
Of course, Yeah, yeah. So what other?
What other? Innovations and then we, we also
came out with I mentioned the Technoflac that embossed
material we have which which looks really great.
It's used in a bunch of Broadwayshows and many applications.
And so we that used to be only available in bulk format.

(48:01):
And so now we also have that to be able to be utilized in
streamer format. So we have Technoflix streamers
now. And so we have, you know, been
very focused as you mentioned. And you know what's what's new
in the confetti world we've beenfocused on.
Last year I'd say it was our consumables.
This year we're focusing on equipment and you talked about,
you know, the technology in the lighting industry and things

(48:23):
moving forward. And I think, you know, we're
looking at how, how can we approve our launchers the the
dispersal of the equipment. And so we're looking at, you
know, TMX integration and on board compressors and things
like that and just looking at atequipment at all of our existing
equipment, figuring out, you know, where can we improve and
iterate on the I. Guess there's some safety

(48:45):
concerns there too, though, likeif you start to automate the the
blasting of these things and somebody's walking by something
and it misfires or whatever, like there's, there's probably,
I'm guessing anyways, is that anissue or a concern?
Always, Yeah. Absolutely, absolutely.
And, and with our our products, the other thing we've done
recently is we've obtained CE approval.

(49:06):
It's a European standard. And with that, we've placed
warning labels, you know, just don't, don't step in front of
this. Read the manual, be careful
here. And yeah, until you'll see
little warning stickers in our equipment now that that we
didn't have. But yeah, you're absolutely
right. Safety's a big, a big part of
our what we do. What about?
Packaging. So like if if I'm if I'm on a

(49:26):
Coldplay tour for example, and Iknow they are one of your big
customers and use a lot of confetti, but am I just getting
these barrels full of confetti or am I getting specially sized
packages depending on how they're being dispersed or
delivered? Well, yeah, Pop plays a great
client of ours through strictly effects and and so, you know,

(49:47):
Chris Martin, lead singer, Coldplay is very environmentally
conscious and you go to his concerts and he's got people
riding stationary bicycles to generate power and there's
carbon offsets and they all the drinks are, are served in
recycling, you know, container recyclable containers.
And and so it's the same with the confetti.
It's all tissue based. And, you know, we're very

(50:08):
particular in the way we we baggage the confetti so that
it's, it's, you know, very minimal impact on the
environment. But yeah, there I'd say they're
at the forefront of, you know, the sustainability environment.
Like if I'm, if I'm doing, if I'm doing just, you know, some
sort of a show, whether it's a Disney or a wedding or whatever
it is. But do you package specifically

(50:28):
for the devices that they're firing from or?
Is it just? Bulk bags or something of
confetti? No, we.
We. Package we find out how, how
they're going to launch. You know, that's a lot of times
we'll say to our client, how arewe, how are we launching this?
You know, which mechanisms, how big is the barrel?
And then we'll be able to make arecommendation and then, you
know, so for say our big shots, it's 2 inch barrel.

(50:49):
We'll, we'll package the items in sleeves of confetti.
And so it helps the operator, they open the bag, they pour the
sleeves of confetti, whether it's just rectangles or
streamers or a custom shape intothe barrel, put a little cap on
it and they can fire. So it's the packaging is
tailored to how it's gonna be used and.

(51:09):
Yeah. It's like pre measured
basically. Yeah, Yes, that's interesting.
Cool. Yeah, I mean, I, I had no idea.
I had no idea how some of this stuff.
So what about new markets? Like are you looking, so you're
looking at innovation, creating like I've always looked at
marketing and sales as there's two approaches, you know,
creating more products for my customers or more customers for

(51:30):
my products. And so as like the the boss, you
know, you're probably doing a little of both, I'm guessing.
Yes, indeed. And you know, I mentioned the
one, the one thing we're going to focus on this year's that
collectible confetti and see howwe can leverage that.
And then I, I think also that we're, you know, we, we've been
in a good position. We, we work with some of the

(51:51):
major theme parks here at Universal Studios and Disney and
a lot of the sports teams and, and professional leagues and,
and a lot of the top, you know, pirate tech and pirate technico.
It's strictly an image. A lot of the big integrators we
work with all those pirate spectaculars.
And so we have great relationships with all those,
those clients and are, are meeting their needs.

(52:14):
And so we, we feel like maybe there's other segments, other
verticals that we could, you know, tackle and, and where we
have a little bit of a presence,but maybe not as much as there
could be. And so, you know, school schools
and universities, right. And, and I think there's a lot
of confetti opportunities, not just with, say, the traditional
commencement, but maybe, you know, at pep rallies and alumni

(52:34):
awards and, you know, athletic events and things like that.
And so that's an area we're going to be exploring and seeing
if that might add some had some revenue and exposure for us.
Yeah. Yeah.
That's interesting. And so as I understand it, it is
I, I believe the former owners have have sold the company.

(52:56):
There's new owners in there now and, and from what I understand,
they're pretty great people and stuff.
Has that changed much for you like you know, business as usual
type of thing or or I'd. Say it's a little, a little bit
of a change, I'd say from an administrative standpoint, you
know, now we have new owners and, and you know, they're,

(53:16):
they're great guys to, to work with, but you know, it's a
little bit more administrative right now.
We have budgets and we have board meetings and there's
strategy decks and there's, you know, it's, it's more
disciplined, I'll say, to kind of take me back to what I did in
the in, in my past life. But so I'm used to it and I'm

(53:37):
comfortable with it, but just a little bit different approach,
if you will. So, so yeah, that's, that's a
little bit different for us in, in this, in this transition, but
but it's great. And I, and I think with, with
having some new owners and new investors, it gives us some
access to, to capital to be ableto invest in, in some of these
R&D projects and to be able to make some bets at and on

(53:57):
different things and, and see how they, how they go.
So it's, I think it's an exciting time in, in the
confetti landscape, if you will.Yeah.
I mean, I think every company grows to a certain level and
then you just need a different set of like what got you from
here to here isn't going to get you from here to here usually,
right. And and you either need to
change structure, ownership, something about the business to

(54:19):
get to that next level. And, and so, yeah, I mean,
sounds like you're in a good place.
Indeed, indeed, yes, I have one,one story if I could share with
you, I think please, which is asit feels like confetti is kind
of having a little bit of a moment.
And I don't know if you've you've seen like there's there's
kind of a famous thing where Jalen Hurts had a picture on his

(54:40):
on his phone, a screensaver. He had a picture of Jalen Hurts
as the quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles.
And they lost the Super Bowl a couple years ago and the
confetti was raining down on him.
But sadly it was the Kansas CityChiefs confetti.
And so he saved that picture on his on his on his lock screen on
his phone for the last couple years as an incentive, as a

(55:01):
motive invader where he was walking off the field under a
sea of of Kansas City Chiefs confetti.
And so this year when the Jalen Hurts and the Eagles won the won
the Super Bowl, there was confetti falling on it, but it
was Eagles confetti this time. And the, the I forget it was
Fox, whatever the reporter, ESPN, Fox or whoever came up to

(55:22):
him, the the Eagles confetti wasfalling on him.
And they said, you know, how does, how does this feel, Jalen,
to have the the Eagles confetti,you know, coming down on you
now? And so that was kind of cool.
Did he change his his screensaver?
Hopefully that's a good question.
I don't know, maybe, maybe he did.
The right color of confetti. Now, at least I you know,
another interesting story that you might want to expand on a

(55:44):
little bit. I saw on your, I think it was on
your Instagram page or somethingthat one of your employees
became like Instagram famous from.
I think it was either the Super Bowl or was it the national
championship game, I can't remember.
It was the Super Bowl. Yes, that's a that's a great
story. So we had, you know, we have
these technicians that, you know, load the confetti and

(56:05):
launch at the Super Bowl. And so somebody took a video of
one of our technicians. There's a young guy, he's in
college, he goes to school up inOregon, he's junior, senior.
And he was loading the confetti into our hopper and somebody
caught this on camera and and called him the confetti guy.
And it it's an ESPN and sportsman picked it up and it

(56:26):
went, you know, that typical phrase it it went viral where I
think there were 80 million views of this, this clip.
Wow, Confetti got and and then hopefully he was.
In company swag or something I hope.
Yeah, yeah. So he had it had the artistry of
Motion box, you know, the the box with our logo on the side
there. And so he had I think there were

(56:47):
14,000 comments where people were like, oh, I always thought
the confetti dropped from the sky.
I didn't know it was, you know, released up and then came down
and, you know, it was, it was really amazing the, the, the
publicity that this garnered. And, and one of the, the really
interesting things that came outof this is that there was a
gentleman who saw this clip who is the head of a, a major

(57:08):
entertainment organization. And he said to his employees, I
want to test that, that big blaster.
I want to test that piece of equipment for an upcoming
installation. They have.
And so the team from this organization got in touch with
us and we're, you know, in, in testing mode, I'll say right now
that's something to provide, youknow, equipment and, and

(57:31):
possibly consumables for this, this major, major theatrical
sports sports product. Well, and you guys that
congratulations, that's incredible.
I mean, when you get a direct lead like that, you know, for
nothing basically like it, it was something that happened very
organically and very for free and you get a a direct lead out

(57:53):
of it. That's pretty, pretty awesome.
But you guys kind of hit the what's what's not a trifecta,
but you what's 2? Because you got the national
championship game and the Super Bowl, right?
Yes, yes, which is pretty great.We do the, it's it and those are
the only two events where we really sent the whole team.

(58:14):
You know, we, we've got sort of a stable, if you will,
technicians that are, you know, can do some work for us as, as
contractors, if you will, on weekends.
And they know how to use our equipment and they have a lot of
knowledge about, you know, arenas and stages and, and
stadiums. And so we have this group, this
group of, of guys and we, we go out to the College Football

(58:34):
playoffs and we do the Super Bowl every year.
Many times these these technicians overlap.
And so, yeah, it's very exciting.
And so those are really the onlytwo events where we will send a
team of our, you know, technicians.
And, and we work with Michael fewer on the college football
and fewer and Live Nation on theon the Super Bowl.

(58:55):
And I think we've been doing theSuper Bowl for close to 30
years, right. When the company was founded,
they I guess what what the the company legacy or the history is
that in the the first Super Bowlwhere we did confetti was 1997.
It was in New Orleans. It was between Green Bay Packers

(59:15):
and the new. England Patriots, You were
there? Yeah, I was at the game I've
been in and the Packers the two games in.
OK, so the Packers. Won that game.
And what we did is we engaged with 200 local high school
football players and we had a section of the stadium and we,
we duct taped two of our reusable handheld confetti

(59:40):
cannons together and we shot confetti.
And so that was, you know, so it, it's gone from that in 1997
to having, you know, 12 big blasters and a few big blasters
for the trophy celebration on the sideline.
So it's, it's morphed into that.So we've been involved in every
Super Bowl city since. That's wild.
And you know, it's it's funny because if I and this, it sounds

(01:00:01):
like I'm blowing smoke, But if Ithink of sort of two confetti
moments in my head, like if it was, if someone was to quiz me
and say, give me two moments where confetti comes in that you
can remember. For me, it would be the Super
Bowl and Coldplay. Those are like, to me, the two
like instant in my head. I'm thinking Coldplay and I'm

(01:00:22):
thinking. The Super Bowl?
Because that's just like confetti on steroids.
Both of those, right? Like a ton of confetti.
Right. It did.
It did yeah. You know, for Coldplay, they use
basically a pallet of confetti every night for for one of their
shows. And they have special shapes.
You know, there's a sky full of stars, there's a song Sky full
of stars. And during that song, of course,
we have star shaped confetti that shoots out.

(01:00:45):
We've got butterfly shaped confetti and there's some day
glow and some regular and there's different colors and
streamers and that's so cool, all sorts of stuff.
So it's it's kind of neat to go to a Coldplay, the show.
There's, I don't know, I think 9or 10 songs that incorporate
confetti that's wild into the song.
So it's a lot of fun. I know you're a bit of a not a
bit of a lot of a fitness guy. So what's, where did that come

(01:01:07):
from and and where's it going? Yeah, yeah, I don't.
You know, I kind of grew up as an active kid and like I said, I
played lacrosse in college and then after that, you know, it's
not too much lacrosse playing you can do after college I got
into some endurance sports and ended up, you know, doing some
triathlon stuff. I, I got really into triathlon

(01:01:29):
for a while and I've done, I think I've done 6 Ironman so far
And, and my, I wouldn't even saya dream, but just this.
And it's sort of, you know, happened organically where at
one point I said to myself, I'vedone a number of Triathle
triathlon disease, Ironman competitions and I had done on
four different continents. And so then my plan was to do, I

(01:01:50):
did one in every continent so far except for Africa.
And right when COVID hit, I was signed up in March of 2020 to do
an Iron Man in South Africa. And COVID hit and they they
postponed it. And so at the time, nobody
really know how long it was going to be and they just
postponed it for six months. So I kept training for this this
race, and then they postponed itagain and again.

(01:02:12):
And they finally, I said, I'm not racing, I'm just going to
race domestically. And so I ended up doing a race
in in Florida. And so so, you know, I still
haven't ticked that box of an Iron Man on every continent.
And they don't have one on Antarctica as far as I know, or
I'd have to make my own iron. But that, that seems kind of
daunting. But yeah, so I've done a number.

(01:02:34):
Yeah. So I've done a number of these
these Iron Man things and I don't know, I like to just I, I
love fitness and I'm trying to start up a artistry of motion
cycling club. I just got some new cycling kit
and yeah, so it's, it's one of my personal passions.
It's just fitness and cycling, swimming, biking, running,
searching golf. There are certainly worse habits

(01:02:56):
you could be into. So that's, that's amazing.
Have you, have you ever followedor or read or listened to David
Goggins at all? I have, I have listened to, I've
read his book. The first one, yeah, yeah.
Can't Hurt Me book. I read that book and then I've
listened to him on a podcast that I tune into once in a
while. He's been on a guest on that
podcast. So yeah, he's pretty inspiring.

(01:03:17):
You know that that guy's. The stuff that he does where he
does these like 100 mile runs and for like after 20 miles his
his ankles broke or something like just insane stories and he
just keeps going like he he doesn't feel pain.
Yeah, he's a unique individual. Yes, indeed.
He is crazy. Well, this has been amazing.

(01:03:38):
I appreciate you doing it. I've learned so much and
hopefully the people listening have learned a little bit.
And I guess best way to find youis is at Artistry in Motion.
Do you do LinkedIn or anything as well?
I have a LinkedIn. Joseph Wojick.
Yeah. My email's Joe at
artistryinmotion.com. And cool.
Yeah, we're, we're here. And if anybody needs some

(01:03:59):
confetti, we're, we're the people to talk to.
I'd love to engage and see how we can help.
That's awesome. Thanks so much, Joe.